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Orange Jumpsuit Award

The New Jim Crow

Van Jones acceptance speech at the NAACP Awards. In view that Republicans have gone to the wall to defeat every single proposal which would possibly lift America out of the economic malaise created by Rethugly policies during the Bushit Administration…Is it any wonder they hate a guy who wants to help fellow Americans go back to work?

Despite the size of the earthquake in Chile being two orders of magnitude worse than that of Haiti’s – the damage is going to be substantially different for a number of reasons. First, the Chilean quake epicenter was along the coastline in Chile, which is sparsely populated. Second, because Chile has had numerous earthquakes, with the most active geological fault in the world running down the center of the country, they have extensive knowledge (and building codes) in the area of building earthquake resistant structures. Coastal Chile has a history of deadly earthquakes, with 13 temblors of magnitude 7.0 or higher since 1973 – as a result, newer buildings are constructed to help withstand the shocks.

Most of the serious damage in Chile will be a long the coastline and the major highway running North-South, although damage in Santiago is reported to be substantial.

Saturday’s quake was 700 to 800 times stronger than the 7.0-magnitude quake that struck Haiti in January, leaving 212,000 people dead and more than a million homeless.

However, it occurred at a greater depth — 21.7 miles — compared to the shallow 8.1-mile depth of the Haiti quake, which contributed to much of the damage there. As such, the basic infrastructure damage (hospitals, fire, police) hopefully is far, far less than the total destruction we saw in Haiti.

With that said, the people of Chile will still need international support, to get food and materials on the ground until the Chilean Government can put things back together. Unlike Haiti, Chile has a strong, stable government, and the most stable economy in South America.

I wasn’t impressed by Whiney Houston’s performance at her free concert in New York to herald her return. Despite substantial electronic help – her voice appeared to be a shadow of it’s former strength and timbre…

“Tiger has no formal affiliation with the organization and has not previewed or endorsed the ad but the image and the idea were too good to pass up when it comes to helping find homes for animals who will otherwise be left out in the cold,” PETA explained in a statement.

Less than 48 hours after the New York Times revealed in a bombshell story that the administration of Gov. David Paterson had intervened in the domestic violence case of a top aide, Paterson has decided to pull the plug on his campaign for governor, the Daily News and the Post are reporting.

No official announcement has been made, but the Post says one is expected later today. Two sources familiar with the decision confirmed to TPM that Paterson will end his campaign.

A Democratic source familiar with New York politics tells TPM the Times story was a “profound disappointment” to Paterson’s friends and staff. “There’s an ongoing discussion about resigning his office,” the source said.

National Democrats are confident that they can hold the New York governorship, an official with the Democratic Governors Association tells TPM.

In response to the Times story, which was published online Wednesday evening, Paterson’s deputy secretary for public safety resigned, saying she had been lied to about the involvement of the state police in the domestic violence case of top Paterson aide David Johnson.

Ben Smith notes that calls for Paterson to resign have been snowballing, with the Daily News running a front-page editorial today headlined “TIME TO GO.”

According to the Timesstory, state police intervened with a woman who was seeking a protective order against Johnson following an alleged assault on Halloween. The story also said that Paterson had spoken to the woman on the phone Feb. 7, the day before she failed to show up in court for a scheduled hearing.

The circumstances of that call are unclear, with Paterson claiming that it was initiated by the woman. The woman’s lawyer says Paterson called her.